UN to monitor safety measures at Pakistani schools: Brown

UNITED NATIONS - Former British Prime Minister and UN Special Envoy for Global Education Gordon Brown said his office would closely monitor efforts, under the Safe Schools Initiative, to improve security at 1,000 schools in Pakistan, saying Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had pledged his support to the move. “We are going to monitor the implementation of safety measures at every school in Pakistan, “Brown told a press conference at UN Headquarters in New York. Security fences, metal detectors, armed guards and emergency communication systems are part of a package of safety measures for Pakistan’s schools being proposed the UN envoy. The former UK prime minister has held talks with Pakistan’s PM Nawaz Sharif last month about making schools safer after the Peshawar school massacre.Brown said he wants to help schools “stand up to terrorist violence”. The proposals follow an agreement between UN envoy Brown and Prime Minister Sharif to improve the safety of schools in Pakistan. It follows a Taliban attack on a school in Peshawar in December in which more than 140 students and staff were killed.Brown is promoting an innovative partnership which will deliver state-of-the-art technology to promote safe schools in Pakistan in cooperation with the government, UNICEF, the Global Business Coalitionfor Education and local NGOs. Spearheaded by pro-bono technology contribution Perdictify. Me, a US-based data science and predictive analytics form, headed by Rob Burns, CEO and Dr. Zeeshan-ul-Hassan Usmani, Co-founder and Chiegf Date scientist. Brown, the UN global education envoy, made a fervent call upon the international community to fund the security improvements.He says such measures to make schools safer will “reassure parents and pupils that everything is being done to counter extremist threats”. Brown said that Prime Minister Sharif had pledged his personal commitment to improving the security of children in school where 5 to 7 million children are out of school.